The University of Missouri-Columbia has established a Health Services Research Center with a National Special Emphasis Program in Health Care Technology. The Center includes a multidisciplinary group of investigators and support staff. It serves to attract the attention of the numerous independent research groups in disciplines relevant to health services research and technology and to facilitate the planning of a cohesive agenda for joint efforts in this field. The products of the Center thus include planning, proposals which it can support, proposals which fall into additional program domains, research conclusions, and a series of communications which are directed to both the scientific and public constituencies. The National Special Emphasis Program in Health Care Technology constitutes the means by which special expertise from within and outside this institution are focused on measuring the impact of technology on health services delivery, and on analyzing societal alternatives and strategies for improving health care. This work takes the form of both research and demonstration projects based on technologic and health service questions which represent major national issues as well as institutional strengths. The initial set of questions center about the application of computers and information systems to health and the positive and negative potential of automation in health care. These studies include the information systems aspects of technologic problems outside primary computer applications. Of special interest are ways in which innovative and beneficial information systems in support of health care delivery can be made widely available.